New York City is alive with energy, fast paced as always and a complete feast to the senses and in this wild city lies some of the most stunning architecture. Besides the most famous of all, the Empire State Building, NYC has a vast array of styles, with a few that stand out and lend themselves to a unique look in the City. Below are some of the eye catching styles that I came across whilst visiting the power house city.
Walking the Chelsea district, you can see where the roaring 20’s time of excitement, freedom of expression, abstraction, jazz and the Joie de vivre left this stylistic Art Deco vibe around the streets. American designers paid homage to the French Art Deco style which created an architectural rhythm evoked from the speed, dance and jazz times.
Along 5th avenue, one of my favourite landmarks, the flatiron building is a sure eye dropper. originally the fuller building, it is a triangular 22 story steel framed landmark. Interestingly it was one of the very first buildings to high rise the Manhattan skyline, and the top 21st and 22nd floor were added 3 years after it was first erected. When the building opened, it only housed bathrooms for men, but later it was alternated, one floor for men, one for women. This building used to be the location where the open air tour bus originated. During its construction, New Yorkers were fearful of its steel cage construction, that they feared it would fall over, due to its size.
With fierce competition at the time to achieve the tallest Art Deco building, The Empire State building was designed in under 2 weeks and when construction began in 1930 it was erected in 15 months, standing as the tallest building in the world for 40 years. The Empire State building is a landmark Art Deco building and possibly New Yorks most famous, with its 102 floors, 6,000 windows, windows lined with aluminium, and an impressive use of how the windows are setback, creating the effect of building blocks. At its crown is an illustrative Art Deco observatory, where you can enjoy the grandest views of the wonder of NYC. Notable tenants of the Empire State building include Linkedin, Shutterstock, Expedia, and even JC Deceaux.
To decide on your favourite Art Deco building can be difficult, so to mention a few examples are the 22 acre Rockefeller centre, the Waldorf Astoria hotel, the Chrysler building and the Eldorado building that stand along 90th & 91st Street, the 2 towers taper by way of geometric setbacks to form sharp, abstract spires. Designed by emery Roth, there are metal fine lines that add a futuristic touch to the terraced texture of the building.
Enjoy to architectural views. XX SR